As Sir Alex Ferguson once said. Except that he was saying it after Man U had just won the Champions league Trophy after a topsy turvy match. Tonight we witnessed a nightmare result for England losing 2-3 to Croatia and thus failing to qualify for the Euro 2008 tournament. All we had to do was draw for gawd’s sake and having fought back from 2-0 down we still managed to snatch defeat from a successful position. What a disastrous qualifying competition this has been. England have been largely dreadful throughout as they’ve been led by the £10m man with no managerial skill whatsoever, sad McClaren, surely the worst England manager of all time.
He’s been a dreadful appointment. He cannot make a decision and stick by it, he cannot inspire his players, his tactics are hopeless, his ability to think on his feet and change things is as bad as Ericsson’s. Tonight we were 2-0 down after 14 minutes and the team playing like frightened rabbits and he did nothing but drink water nervously. He was even stood there holding an umbrella so that his ridiculous hairstyle wouldn’t get disturbed by the rain. For christ’s sake man are you a leader of men or the leader of the cheerleaders? He employed one up front, defensive tactics in a game from which we had to get a result and against a team already qualified. Two early goals and they would have folded and caught an early flight home. Instead we handed them the initiative from the off. Carson was a selection mistake and 5 in midfield too.
The half-time changes were overdue but necessary and nearly did it for England but Croatia were just too smart and deserved possibly two more goals. How many chances did England need to qualify? Maybe now there will be wholesale changes at the FA and at management level although I’ve just heard on the radio that McClaren won’t be standing down. Of course not, there’s £8m still at sake on his contract and as we all know there’s absolutely no honour nor real pride in football these days. He’ll leave ‘by mutual consent’ no doubt in the next couple of days with a £5m cheque in his pocket and he’ll walk into a media role with the BBC straight away at £1m pa. Either that or he’ll tip up at Birmingham at £2m pa. Talk about money for old rope. He was found out at Boro’ and yet he’ll continue to make a huge living for at least 10 years out of the game. The autobiography can’t be far away.
I’m completely fed up with the game at this level to be honest. I no longer care whether England get through to major tournaments or not. I no longer care who’ll be the next England manager. They’ll never get the right guy anyway. I despise what the FA are doing, spending almost £1B on a stadium that sports a pitch like a swamp. And we had the gall to criticise the Russians for playing on an artificial pitch. Scotland and N Ireland have shown England how to take the hard decisions and to make forward progress on the world stage. Whereas the English FA has squandered huge resources on an overblown yet failing facility, dreadful management, over-indulged players and disastrous leadership. We deserve to fail with these chumps in control. Perhaps now is the time to put limits on the number of foreign players coming into the English leagues too. And for the Government to step in to appoint someone appropriate to clear out the crap at the FA and to start again with a proper administration.
pp
Pasta Paulie 
I agree that McLaren is crap. This was made clear after he flip-flopped over Beckham’s selection to the side. But I also think that a lot of the blame has to be laid at the players’ feet – guys like Gerrard and Lampard never seem to deliver the goods in an England shirt.
You’re also right when you say that there are now too many foreign players in the Premier League. In the past England were renowned for the quality of their keepers. Now they are a laughing stock because there is simply not enough of them playing at the top level.
I’m afraid it’s going to take a lot more than appointing a new coach to sort this mess out.
sadly m, you’re right. it’s going to need root and branch change at the FA and from what i heard today they had their sacrificial lambs and the same guys will remain in control and will probably appoint another waste of space at managerial level at £millions of cost.
i really do wish for the Min of Sport to step in and take control of the appt of a new admin and new head. English football is the best watched, most lucrative football league in the world and yet we under-perform at national level. the problems aren’t hard to isolate. it just takes courage and boldness to deal with them. simply said but very hard for us to deliver it seems. but necessary
pp